Rest day: Fontainbleau

With no pressure to get the miles under the belt (over 750 covered now) team Probert lazed in their sleeping bags until Dad returned from a visit to the Boulangerie with croissants and pastries, again carefully selected to comply with the targets set by the teams fitness director.

After manhandling Greg out of the tent once again we sat on our panniers on the banks of the Seine eating our petit dejeuner watching the barges chug by and the construction of the imaginatively designed water treatment plant on the opposite bank.

Keeping up the fitness and exercise regime in the absence of any riding today we proceeded to circumnavigate the Samoreau lake, further exercise being taken in the form of impromptu games of "slog the stone into the lake with a broken branch". The jury's out on man of the match but as I'm writing this I'd say Dad was easily best batsman and bowler (got to make up for some of the abuse I get in other blog entries)(editor's note: Tom hit the most stones into the lake and most consecutive hits).

We headed into Fontainbleau again. His head filled with recent GCSE history revision, and desperate for cultural fulfilment Greg was psyched as we headed straight for the Chateau. Having seen the "wee-ing dog" fountains and walked past the front of the Chateau Gregs enthusiasm was satisfied and we set off for somewhere to have a quiet sit down - i.e. a bar.

Tom opted for moules marinierre, which has become a Probert challenge staple over the years. Memories of three days laid up in Majorca was enough to make Dad spurn the mussels option in favour of a less colonically challenging quiche and salad, while Greg selected some dodgy looking orange/yellow sausages which we were assured were better than they looked.

After some more nostalgic rambling through the back streets of Fonenbleau, and a visit to the tail end of the Friday market, we headed (this is starting to sound monotonous) for a bar to charge iPhones, write up the blog and watch the latest stage of Le Tour.